


From Warm to Cold

by Millixi77



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Dangan Ronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing, Super Dangan Ronpa 2
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Gen, from the pov of the zombie, im sorry, this is kind of confusingly written
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-01
Updated: 2018-07-21
Packaged: 2019-05-31 12:22:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15119330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Millixi77/pseuds/Millixi77
Summary: Makoto gets bitten and turns into a zombie... and as it turns out, being a zombie is a bit difficult. Thinking about some things were hard, he couldn't remember things very well, and memories came out of nowhere, confusing him. Being a zombie wasn't as scary as most people thought.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This started from an errant thought about having a zombie au from the point of the zombie. In this case, Makoto. I have to thank the Discord server for inspiring me to expand the world a little, and actually write down this idea. Especially, I thank @Papakuma, @kirb with crocs and @strange off-brand kirby for inspiring me to actually write this!
> 
> Also, I experimented a little with my writing style in this one. However, I feel that it turned out well.

Makoto groaned, feeling groggy and confused. He didn’t want to wake up, he didn’t want to move. He didn’t want to do anything at all…

 

Over the past few weeks, he’d been feeling sick. He’d become tired and sluggish, and he could barely pull his own weight anymore. The small group of people he’d been tagging along with just up and abandoned him a few days ago, and since then, he didn’t know if it was from the emotional or physical pain, he just couldn’t move anymore. And anyway, was it days or weeks? It was too dark in here to tell...

 

He’d been lying down on the floor of some miserable, broken-down warehouse ever since then, waiting for his eventual downfall. He could faintly feel the pain lingering on the edges of his senses...

 

It had started with a small headache. From there it escalated to migraines. And if that wasn’t bad enough, his joints had just… stopped working, as far as he could tell. He could barely walk or hold anything; it was like he’d turned into some sort of wooden puppet without joints. It had been hard to move at that point, but he could actually move. When his back had started aching, he was confined to lying down. 

 

Then, he’d started feeling hungry. Very, very hungry, and for what, he didn’t know. All he knew was that normal food and drink wasn’t enough; it didn’t taste good anymore, and he wanted something else. But at the time, he didn’t know what else he could have eaten; he didn’t think he had pica.

 

Then, he’d started to suspect something. He felt hungrier around the people in his group, and if he could have moved with ease, he was sure he’d be staying around them much more than a normal person would. They suddenly smelled delicious, and his mouth watered a little when they were near. Of course, he hadn’t told them about that.

 

It was around that time that he realized just what was happening. A zombie must have bitten him some time ago, and now he was turning into one, albeit slowly.

 

And it wa soon after that that his group had ditched him; he’d become too much of a dead weight to serve any useful purpose. All he did was make it harder for them to travel from place to place, and waste resources. He wondered… did they figure it out, and didn’t want to bother with killing him? Were they just thinking of how useless he had become? He would never know.

 

So here he was, slowly starving to death, slowly turning into a monster. And now, his memories were getting fuzzy. Oh, sure, he could remember his name, his age, where he was from, and his family. But things started to blur from there.

 

He couldn’t remember the names of the schools he’d attended. He couldn’t remember the names of his friends, and he couldn’t really remember their appearances either. His likes and dislikes blurred, and he could barely remember a thing about the group he’d been travelling with after the zombie apocalypse started.

 

In fact… had he been travelling with a group or not…?

 

The memories of the recent weeks were blurry and he couldn’t really remember much, just vague blurs. But he could remember things from a year before a little better? Wait, year. What year was it? He couldn’t remember. Wait… what was he thinking about again?

 

His stomach growled. Hunger… he was hungry… but he couldn’t move or find food to eat. He whimpered in pain. Food… tasty food… ah, what he wouldn’t give for food right now. He had no idea of just what he wanted to eat, but he knew that he would definitely know it when he saw it. But he was so tired, he couldn’t move… why couldn’t he move?

 

He’d… he’d gotten sick. Yes... but with what? His memory seemed scrambled. He would remember again soon, he knew that. This sometimes happened, when he couldn’t think well. He knew why it happened, didn’t he? It couldn’t be stopped, could it? No…

 

What was it? He felt his eyebrows furrowed as he tried to concentrate. He knew what it was, right? Yeah, he did, but what was it specifically? Ah… right. He was turning into a zombie, and he had no idea when he’d been bitten, yeah.

 

He coughed. It was raspy; almost a death rattle. His throat was so dry… was he dying? Zombies were the living dead, right? And he was turning into one… he was dying. It had been harder to see things for the past few days, too. Everything was all blurry and unpleasant to look at in general… he closed his eyes. This was better… it felt nice.

 

The pain had stopped, thank goodness… wait, when? He’d been… in pain? Yes, he’d been hurting a lot over the past few weeks. But now, he wasn’t hurting anymore? Was that even the right word to use? 

 

No pain… no pain. He wasn’t in pain any more. That was good… no pain, no pain… quiet, quiet was nice… peaceful… no movement… peaceful… sleep...

 

…

 

He felt cold, now. What was cold, again? Or was it… numb? He couldn’t feel anything. Something in his chest kind of… jumped at that. Was it... scary? Wasn’t it supposed to be nice to not be in pain anymore? Wasn’t it supposed to be good? Why was it so scary all of a sudden?

 

He tried to move a little, but he couldn’t He couldn’t feel anything… he couldn’t move… why was his heart beating so fast? Why was he… he was gasping? Gasping for air… air... why did he need to breathe again? … he felt tired… he wanted to sleep…

 

But why… was falling asleep so scary? He hadn’t been able to sleep well for a long time, and now he was finally getting to sleep. It was kind of strange that he couldn’t really feel anything, yes… But you never really felt things in your sleep unless someone was waking you up. Nobody was waking him up, right? So it was normal that he didn’t feel anything, wasn’t it?

 

Nobody would wake him up. Nobody was with him. He didn;t know where his family had went, and those other guys-- wait, family? What was that? Family… he couldn’t remember too well… wait. What was he thinking about?

 

Cold. It was cold now. His heart was… um, what was that again… oh right, the thing that kept moving around in his chest. It wasn’t moving anymore. That felt nice. It had been moving too much for some reason earlier. It wasn’t letting him sleep well for some reason... and… 

 

He... wasn’t... moving...? 

 

He wasn’t moving at all. 

 

Something inside him was screaming, saying that something was wrong… was he supposed to be moving?  Something in him told him he was supposed to be… well not him, really, but something inside him, was supposed to be moving. And it was supposed to be warm. 

 

What was warm?

 

Something moved. It was… inside him? But something was wrong, something was wrong, it wasn’t right, he shouldn’t be moving, this wasn’t right,  _ it wasn’t right, oh god no why did this happen make it stop please  _ **_make it stop make it stop---_ **

 

Makoto’s eyes opened. He was hungry again… really hungry. He wanted to eat… something warm… and squishy. Meat? Yes… but… it had to be  _ living _ meat… tasty meat... 

 

He was hungry, he needed to eat… he should look for food, shouldn’t he? He could move now.

 

He wasn’t able to move before… why? He didn’t remember. It didn’t matter, did it? It wouldn’t help him find food. He sat up and looked around. He had no idea where he was, but… some part of him felt… sad? And scared? When he looked at it. He didn’t know why.

 

He stood up, a bit awkwardly, and looked for how to get out. He had to get out to get food, didn’t he? He had to hunt for food. Food wouldn’t come to him would it? So he looked around, walking around the strange place. No food here…

 

Wait… he smelled something. Something that smelled good, very good… he heard something move behind him. And it smelled  _ delicious _ .

 

“Hey!” the prey was making noises… no… that was called… speaking... “Are you… are you another survivor? W-Why are you in here? Wait… where are your supplies? Did your team ditch you or did you not carry anything with you?” 

 

What was all that supposed to mean? Something in him felt scared, didn’t want it to be here… it made no sense, so he discarded it. He felt excited; the prey smelled delicious! It was food! And food would take away the hunger!

 

He turned around, and it screamed, turned around and started running.

 

He chased after it. 

 

This was hunting, wasn’t it? He kind of liked it… but he didn’t really like this particular prey... Its sounds were too loud and squeaky for his taste. That, and it was pretty fast… he didn’t want to run a lot to get his prey… but he’d have to, in this case.

 

He ran as fast as he could, pursuing it. Something in him was screaming, it didn’t want to do it, wanted him to stop. But he couldn’t. He needed to eat, and it was food. And he didn’t want it to get away… bad things would happen if it got away…

 

Soon he had the prey cornered. It had tried to run between two buildings, but there was something at the back of the space that didn’t let it run anymore. And now it looked… scared? And something was running down its face, from its eyes… what were those? It didn’t matter, it was food.

 

Something in him screamed as he lunged forward and bit into the prey, enjoying the taste. It was so delicious, he loved it! But why was it making those loud noises again… did that mean he had to eat it quickly? He didn’t want someone else to steal his prey, but he didn’t want to eat it too fast either. So he ate at a steady pace, hoping it would stop making that noise… and...

 

It did! And it was really tasty after all, and it was definitely nicer to eat when it wasn’t screaming. Wait, screaming? What was screaming? Was it those loud noises it had made earlier? It didn’t matter, did it? He had to finish this meal first before thinking of big unnecessary things like that! 

 

But it was really big… he’d have to finish it over more time, he was getting full but he was only halfway through it. He pouted. But where would he keep it? Would he keep it in that big place where he woke up in? 

 

Yeah, that sounded fine!

 

But… his face was wet. And it wasn’t only the tasty red stuff that came out of the prey… it was coming from his eyes! Something fell away from the prey. It was small, rectangular and shiny. He picked it up. 

 

He didn’t know what it was, and something in him felt irritated when looking at it. It wasn’t food, or anything useful, and there was this picture on the back of it that looked… like… something he couldn’t remember. And there were a few knob thingies on it. He looked close at it, and saw something in it… was it… wa that his face?

 

He touched his face, and… it was actually was his face… water was coming from his eyes.

 

He blinked, and his vision got blurry before he blinked the water out. Was… was he... sad? Water only came out of the eyes when people were sad, right? Wait. What was sad? And what was people? And what was this thing, anyway? It was getting smeared my the red stuff too... and it wasn’t necessary.

 

And now it was kind of slippery, too… and his hand slipped a little and pressed one of the knobs.

 

Light came out of it! He dropped it. That was scary! What was that thing? And why would the prey carry that thing around for? To scare him? It wasn’t even edible, to… was it? Something told him it wasn’t... 

 

But, should he take it? Technically it was part of the prey...? But it was scary… and unnecessary. So he left it alone and took only the prey.

 

For some reason, he lost his appetite a little. He’d finish the prey later. It wasn’t super big prey, but he would finish it quick… he started feeling hungry again.

 

So he ate more of the prey, and something inside him felt… felt really sad. Wasn’t food supposed to be good? Prey was food. Food made the hunger go away. Hunger was bad, so not feeling hungry was good, so he shouldn’t be sad. He needed to eat more of the prey, then! Eat more and more and more!

 

It took kind of a long time… the prey may not have been really big but… Makoto was small… so he took a long time to eat it! But he finally finished it, and he felt kind of happy about that. But there was a problem with that… finishing the prey meant that there was no prey...

 

There was only this hard white stuff that… kind of looked like the prey but wasn’t really tasty… but he chewed on them occasionally; it was fun to break them. Mostly the small ones that looked like those spindly thingies that the prey had. They were kind of longish, but thin and small. He accidentally swallowed a few....

 

And the water still kept coming out of his eyes for no reason at times… he couldn’t understand why. He was just eating, wasn’t he? Nothing was sad about food! Food was good and tasty… food was happy! Wait, what was happy? Was it not-sad? Hmm… happy sounded nicer than not-sad. Happy was good.

 

Something felt… nicer inside him after that? Happy was good! And he was happy because he wasn’t hungry for now! He would have to hunt again soon, though, he was starting to feel a little hungry even now… he pouted. He didn’t like hunger. But he liked food! And hunger helped him get food.

 

...was hunger good or bad? Wait, where had that come from? He just needed to eat… nothing more, nothing less. Though he didn’t want to leave this big place yet… he knew he would have to. Prey was always hard to get…

 

Should he look for prey now, before the hunger made him feel sad, or wait? He gnawed on a white thing, thinking about it. He didn’t like feeling sad, and hunting made him happy, so maybe he should hunt… but… he was also… scared of the prey?

 

Something seemed scary and sometimes something in him felt… too fast, it was jumping everywhere. And he sometimes saw… things. He felt like he was supposed to know them, but he couldn’t understand why… he saw these weird things when he was asleep, and they were usually blurry… but they hadn’t been coming for a few times now, and he had nothing to do, so he slept.

 

And then he saw something… that was… clear...

  
  


Somewas was… standing over a woman with black hair, and the red stuff was leaking out of her. Something felt scared and sad inside him, and then… and then the thing that was eating the woman looked at him, and loud squeaky noise came out of him as he moved back, but he fell and it came closer, until… something loud. Something very loud happened, and he covered his ears, and the thing that had wanted to eat him fell down with a hole in its head. And then he felt the water coming out of his eyes, and then… and then…

 

Makoto sat up and looked around, scared. What was that? He… he’d been sleeping and then… that… that thing… and he was confused! It… it just wanted to eat! But he didn’t want it to eat him… why would it eat him? Who was that woman, and… why was water coming out of his eyes now? Why did he feel sad? Something in his stomach felt uncomfortable… why?

 

What was he? And… what was he doing…? Eating was good… eating made him happy… and that thing was… it was doing what he was doing right now… was he… what was he doing?

 

...why couldn’t he look at the white things any more? Why was he… why was he curling into himself… why didn’t he want to do anything?

 

W-Why… why couldn’t he focus…

 

...why was he crying?...

 

…

 

He didn’t know. 

 

Wait, crying? Was that what it meant when water came out of his eyes? He remembered the look on the prey’s face when he was about to eat it… and… and...

 

Why was he crying more? Why was he crying louder? Why did he feel so sad and angry with himself? 

 

Eating was supposed to be good, but why didn’t he not want to eat ever again? Why? He couldn’t understand…

 

Why was this happening to him? Why…

 

Something came behind him, and it wasn’t prey.

 

But… he couldn’t bring himself to move...

 

“What’s wrong?” 

 

He looked back, confused.

 

“You’re crying. Something’s wrong, isn’t there?” this thing wasn’t prey, but Makoto didn’t know what it was. It was bigger than him, and that was kind of scary. But it sounded… nice?

 

His eyebrows furrowed.

 

“You can’t talk?”

 

“T-Talk?” something came out of his throat and it sounded… not nice. It sounded rough, and sad, and it was too quiet…

 

“You… you don’t remember anything from before you became a zombie, do you?”

 

“Zom...bie?” What was that?

 

The thing breathed out. “Do you remember your name?”

 

Name... “Ma...ko...to...” That sounded right.

 

“Makoto… that should be your first name. Do you remember your last name?”

 

He shook his head. Was that… family. It had something to do with family… he couldn’t remember family. What was family anyway? Why was he thinking about it again… He looked at the person again, confused.

 

“That’s a no… My name is Hajime Hinata, alright?”

 

“Ha...ji...me…?”

 

“Yes, that’s my name.” The person pointed to himself. Makoto nodded.

 

“Let’s get out of here… a bunch of zombie hunters are coming here soon, and, well… they won’t like it if they see us here.”

 

Zombie hunters. That made him feel afraid. He sat up quickly.

 

“So you remember a little… maybe you’ll remember more over time. At least you’re not like the ones who forget everything and go feral. I’m guessing that’s probably because you were able to hunt earlier than they usually get to.”

 

What. He was confused. Wait. What was confusion? He felt his eyebrows furrow as he looked up at… Hajime. Hajime… that was the other person’s name? Yes… it was...

 

“Well, come on, stand up! We’re lucky that the myth of zombies being slow is false as hell, you know?” 

 

Makoto stood up, a bit shaky. 

 

Wait. “Zom-bie…” he said under his breath. 

 

What was that? Was that… what he was? 

 

“Zombie?” That word was hard to say… he didn’t like talking...

 

“You’re starting to get it,” Hajime said. Makoto looked up at him again. What did that mean? Hajime was confusing sometimes. 

 

Wait. What was confusing? 

 

Why was all these weird things popping up in his head? He didn’t understand...

 

“Come on, time to run! You can figure things out later!”

 

Makoto looked up at him, then listened. Something…in the distance… was it… screaming, and… noises… high, scary noises… were coming closer… and even though it smelled like prey… it sounded scary… not tasty. He felt… scared...

 

“Run!”

 

He ran as fast as he could, following Hajime. They ran... and ran and ran and ran… a lot. He didn’t know how long they ran or where they were going, he trusted Hajime to lead him somewhere safe.

 

Safe. That sounded nice… and something in him felt… happy? Safe was good, like hunting and eating! Eating was good, wasn’t it?

 

Something in him didn’t really feel sure...

 

“Alright, we’re here,” Hajime said. 

 

Makoto looked at him, then looked in front of him. It was… another big place like where he;d been before, but this one looked nicer. And… he couldn’t really smell much prey around here… was that good or bad? He would be hungry… hungry was bad...

 

“Well, follow me.” 

 

And him and Hajime walked into the big place. And then… there were others inside! Others like him and Hajime… he felt nervous, so he stayed behind Hajime.

 

“I found another one,” Hajime said.

 

“What mental state are they in?” someone with purple hair asked. It was… it was a... she. A girl? Yeah, the second one sounded nice. But she was purple. Purple… everywhere. Purple hair, purple eyes… wearing purple… things… 

 

His… his head hurt all of a sudden, and he covered his face.

 

“He only remembers pretty basic things, but he seems to gradually get his memories back. Probably through events that trigger them, I think… he can barely talk, though.”

 

“That’s fine,” someone else said. It sounded… sleepy. He looked for the person. It was another girl.  Their hair was curled at the end and was pink. She… looked tired.. And she was nice looking. But not is nice looking as the purple girl.

 

“Well, I hope they’re not too stupid,” someone else said. “We’ve already had to nurse two idiots back into their right minds, we really don’t have time for that!” He couldn’t see the person... where were they?

 

“Kokichi,” the purple girl said, “shut up.”

 

“Never!”

 

“Nyeh… I don’t care…” this was said by a red girl. This one looked even sleepier than the pink one, and lazier.

 

“Do you care about anything, Himiko?” Hajime asked.

 

“No, not really.”

 

Hajime breathed out really loudly this time. “Anyway, this is Makoto.”

 

“Shy! He… shy! Look!” This one was said by… another girl. But… this one was… yellow, purple and pink, all at the same time. And she looked… nice? “Face… he covering it!”

 

“Fantastic deduction, Kaede,” the one he couldn’t see said again. “Now, shut up!”

 

“Kokichi, stop! Even you were shy when we first met up together!” This was… pink.But not the quiet one… this was a boy, and he was… very bright. Very bright pink. It was almost scary.

 

“Why you always lying?” the unseen person said.

 

“W-What? What?! Oh, come on! You’re the consummate liar here!” The pink seemed… not happy now. 

 

Now he felt more nervous.

 

“Silence, mortals! The New One is unnerved by this verbal war you choose to have between yourselves! As well as the Cap-Wearing One and the Innocent One!” a tall, scary person said.

 

Makoto vaguely felt more fear pass over him before he started shaking a little.

 

“Gundham, please be a little quieter?” the sleepy pink one said. “You scared him more...”

 

“Hmph, alright.”

 

“Look who’s scaring them now?”

 

“Kokichi, stop it, will you?” Hajime also sounded not-nice now… “And where are Shuuichi and Kiibo anyway?”

 

The red one lazily pointed to some place he couldn’t see. “They were just… um… staying together over there, nyeh…”

 

“And where’s Komaeda?”

 

“Hunting… nyeh.”

 

“So everyone is accounted for, that’s good.”

 

Hajime finally looked back at him. Luckily he wasn’t shaking anymore.

 

“Don’t be scared, you’ll be safe here. Trust me.” Makoto nodded. After they’d all stopped… talking, they weren’t too scary… except for the super loud one and bright pink one. Kind of scary.

 

“Alright then… guess we wait for Komaeda to get back, I guess.”

 

“True.”

 

Hajime then left him alone, and went to talk with nice purple one. Something in him felt both sad and… angry? He quickly went off to a small corner, feeling nervous and lonely. But… someone… came closer to him?

 

“Hi!” The one with yellow hair came up to him. What was her name…? “What…your name?”

 

Name... “M...Makoto…”

 

She pointed to herself. “Ka-Kaede!”

 

“Ka...e-de?”

 

“Kaede!” She was nice. “W-Where you… f-from?” she asked.

 

“Um… very… far. No… like it. No… no re… no re-mem...ber...”

 

“O-Oh… sorry…”

 

“I-It… fine.”

 

“Mmm… how you like… how you like here?”

 

“...loud one is scary…”

 

Kaede laughed. “He no scary! He… only loud.”

 

“R-Really?”

 

She nodded. “More people here! Want see?”

 

He nodded. And she took him by the hand, and led him over to the others, introducing him to them one by one.

 

He felt very, very happy now. This place… was nice. And nice was good. The people here were nice. And… he was sure… that things would continue to be nice from then on...


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hajime's story was... far more complex than it seemed at first. In fact, he couldn't remember all of it, though he remembered most of it. But what he did remember was far from pleasant.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long wait! I got... more than a little distracted, and my motivation to write was scarce. But I managed to finally brush up this chapter and post it!

Hajime and Kyoko were lurking near the back of the warehouse, watching the others. Everyone had finished feeding less than an hour ago, and they’d mainly split into different groups, either talking to each other or just sitting next to each other.

 

Makoto and Kaede seemed to be getting along well with each other, and while their memories were trickling in slowly, there had been a little progress. Hajime was grateful for that… the only thing was that Makoto seemed to have a penchant for gnawing on bones. It was a bit worrying, seeing how animalistic it was, but he couldn’t say for sure…

 

“Worried about Makoto?” Of course, she’d be able to read him like an open book.

 

“A little,” Hajime hedged. “I know it’s probably unwarranted for, but… look, I’m not looking for prodigy-like progress, but it’s been three months and he hasn’t shown any sign of slowing down a little, thoughtless of stopping. Even Kiibo started to slow down a little after the same time frame…”

 

“You’re observant. Also, notice that his developments have been slower than the average we’ve managed to pinpoint. I’m starting to think either he took a long time to fully turn or was ill prior to being turned.” Kyoko said it all with a neutral expression.

 

“That… doesn’t sound good at all…”

 

“However, we could simply be incorrect.”

 

“Yeah, I guess…” Hajime felt tired.

 

“Not feeling well?” she asked.

 

“Yeah… you could say that. I guess I’ve been overthinking a few things. Or, a lot of things actually.”

 

“As am I.”

 

“Yeah…” he wanted a little space to think right now.

 

Kyoko nodded, and walked to another area of the warehouse, starting a discussion with Komaeda and Himiko. She must have had some sort of powerful intuition… she reminded him of Sonia, to be honest. Sonia always knew when to help and when to back off…

 

And with that, a pang of regret practically seared him. He’d… he’d failed them; he’d failed all of them. And he’d gotten at least half of them killed in the process, too. He… he was just another worthless zombie who’d managed to get his head straight when it was far too late for it to be of any real use.

 

He was a failure, as a teammate, as a leader.

 

He couldn’t even say he was a failure as a person because he wasn’t even human. He was a mockery of a human being, a walking corpse reanimated by some kind of virus.

 

He gritted his teeth. Who knew World War III would have come like this? The world had turned into an awful mix of places that had been ravaged by nuclear war or places where the effects of bioweapons had practically destroyed civilization. Who knew that science had evolved so quickly that viruses could be deliberately used in warfare?

 

He didn’t know everything; it was Kyoko who did. But thanks to being able to look through what remained of the media, and with a lot of filling in of gaps done by Kyoko, he’d been able to see just what had actually happened.

 

It started a little close to home, in China, to be specific. That was a little odd, to be honest. At least it seemed that way, before looking at the bigger picture. So, some people had volunteered for some sort of government-funded experiment. They went in as normal human beings and came out as zombies. Then, they were contained and sent to different countries for active testing...

 

People were being turned left and right, people were panicking, the news was going insane… and then people smartened up. Cars, jeeps, tractors, all kinds of vehicles came into play. Why? Because unlike guns, these could kill zombies much faster and efficiently, and there had been places where the zombie virus was nearly nonexistent.

 

Unlike all the zombie movies and all, humans had more common sense.

 

The problem was that, even as the zombies were getting killed, more were being produced, and not just the ones in traditional human form. Horrific experiments using animals of all sorts, even a few abominations that could loosely be called artificial humans were used to spread the infection.

 

The little he knew made him feel completely and absolutely disgusted. And of course, America and Russia had started the conflict. China was a major ally for Russia, as Europe was for America. Those four and those four alone were bound to cause chaos, but then the Middle East started their own attacks within themselves and other countries, and worse, North Korea. Things had spread like wildfire from there, and everything suddenly turned into full-on Eastern Hemisphere versus Western Hemisphere conflict, with only a few countries that defied that rule.

 

And of course, Japan was eventually pushed into it. And soon, the zombie infection was planted there. It unsure how, whether they’d released zombies from another country or infected a few people in secret somehow, but whatever happened initially, zombies quickly spread throughout the country. Then, combine that with all of the warfare that had ravaged the country by then, Japan was ruined.

 

He’d barely managed to scrape by until he’d found his group.

 

Or rather, they had found him. And at the time, he hadn’t been in the best place… in fact, none of them had really started off well.

 

…---...

 

He’d been looking through an old, run-down store, trying to see if anything resembling food was still inside it. So far, he hadn’t had any luck. And he was hungry…. so very hungry… he sighed. Some people would have called him a bottomless pit… he’d even eat scraps by this point; he hadn’t seen much food for the past two weeks.

 

That, and he’d been gradually working through his supply of water… it would be hard to find water… he had no idea which bodies of water were tainted or not, and rain…

 

He hadn’t liked rain before all of this, but now he outright hated it. It did more than just get people wet now; it was almost stupid just how acidic it had become… even at that, rain barely fell nowadays. That was something he considered lucky.

 

And to top it off, he hadn’t been feeling well for the past few weeks… he just hoped it wouldn’t escalate again. He’d gotten sick far too many times already, it was almost irritating. But some part of him wondered just what would happen if his apparent luck ran out. He didn’t even want to consider it.

 

He sighed as he stood up. This place was completely barren… he’d have to look somewhere else… He dragged his feet as he went to the front door to exit. Before this had happened, he hadn’t been the most optimistic of people, but this hasn't helped his pessimism at all. Really, everywhere he looked, the world was a barren wasteland.

 

The world as humans knew it was destroyed because humans could never coexist with one another without resorting to some of the stupidest, overrated lengths to satisfy their greed and wrath. He was no saint himself, but really, it was just shameful.

 

Humanity had finally imploded in itself and he was sure that humans would die out after this, after managing to destroy the world beyond repair. Even if things survived, it would be a long time before anything would grow on the Earth. That idea itself wasn’t even feasible at all.

 

The world was dying. Humans were dying, killed by abominations that would die out themselves after destroying all humans. After that, there would be nothing left. Nothing left but a barren wasteland of a planet, like every other planet in the solar system, like every other planet in the galaxy.

 

Nothing would be left. Just a gigantic, miserable-looking rock with nothing on it except for the remains of all sorts of things, both things that were normal and things that shouldn’t have existed.

 

Everything would eventually die down to nothing. And he was still bothering to try and keep on living because… because of he… maybe he wasn’t thinking of this right.

 

Alright, the world was on a one way trip to hell. He knew that. And he was struggling to survive because… because…

 

Because…

 

He had no answer.

 

Why was he trying? He had nothing to strive towards anymore. Nothing that he could look up to. No reason to study, make sure his grades were as good as they could be, no reason to strive for a scholarship for university. No reason to try and make his parents proud of him, no reason to try and convince himself that he isn’t a complete waste of space… no reason to work, no reason to try.

 

The only reason he was scraping by, trying to survive, was because it was work. Hard work. He was used to working hard; he used to work as hard as he could with his academics, and always, always, turned out to just barely pass the cut of mediocre. He’d always worked hard and reaped nothing in return.

 

He’d been trained to work, work, work, and work mindlessly, rushing to the given checkpoints people above him would give, to barely make the cut for the said checkpoint, and repeat it again and again, over and over, numbing his mind to how tedious, how pointless it was.

 

Like he was a stupid hamster on a running wheel, running, running, desperate to get somewhere, not knowing that the wheel was stationary, that he was only proving to be a source of entertainment for onlookers, running, running, trying to reach an unachievable goal.

 

The reason he was trying to survive was that he’d grown used to this cycle of fruitless labor, even though it was inevitable that he would die. This was just another kind of fruitless labor that

 

would ultimately

 

lead to

 

his

 

own

 

demise

 

He felt something snap within him.

 

Then he felt a realization, and everything dropped into place. The reason why he continued breaking his back, making useless efforts, even though now there was nobody to impress, nothing to strive for, no reason to live.

 

He was working himself to death because there was nothing else he could do. He was working himself to death because there was nothing else he knew how to do.

He was working himself to death because there was nothing else he was good for. He was working himself to death because there was nothing else he was useless.

Hajime felt tears gather in his eyes, and he felt himself smiling, a miserable, broken smile, as his mind went on, grinding its gears, working hard like he’d trained it to do. Like he’d been trained to think.

he was working himself to death because there was nothing else he wanted to do. he was working himself to death because there was nothing else he could do. he was working himself to death because he was useless

He heard laughter as he fell on his knees, burying his head in his hands. He felt tears falling from his eyes, and he passively noticed that the laughter had to be coming from him.

 

He could hardly bring himself to care.

 

he was working himself to death because he was nothing he was working himself to death because that was all he was a machine working in the same pattern even though there was no assembly line he was working himself to death because he was a broken machine unable to adapt to new circumstances he was working himself to death because he was stuck repeating the same fruitless labors that had done nothing for him in the past he was working himself to death because

 

because

 

because he was a failure

 

Everything faded to black.

 

 

But not all was peaceful.

 

He felt like he was watched, being hunted.

 

Strange things were hiding in the shadows, curling in on themselves, mocking him.

 

They had gathered around as if they were eager to watch something, and he couldn't tell what it as or why.

 

Then there was… some horrific beast coming at him, was it trying to… to kill him? Something in him stirred up, and he fought against it, against whatever the beast was.

 

It had disgusting, malformed teeth and claws that looked like knives, and whatever other feature is had were lost upon him.

 

He heard the shadows chanting, mocking him, laughing, pointing. Laughing, cheering on the fight.

 

He didn’t understand it at all…. was this real, or was this fake?

 

Was this just another fever dream that his brain had concocted? He might never know…

 

And then things just started swirling and swirling and getting brighter and brighter and brighter until he couldn’t understand anything anymore.

 

A cacophony of laughter and taunts floated through the air, swirling around him, circling him, circling him, catching him in their crazy arcs and circles and tying his own, not letting him move at all.

 

And the laughter got louder and louder until he couldn’t even hear himself think and everything kept on swirling into each other, a disgusting, neon paste smeared as far as he could see. He didn’t even know what color this was…

 

It just felt sickening to look at, sickening to his entire being. It traveled through his eyes and into his body, squirming and searing him and spreading, spreading, spreading…

 

Skeletons materialized out of nowhere and danced, swirling and twisting unnaturally. The laughter increased as if the shadows were pleased with this new entertainment.

 

Then one of them turned to him, it's jaw gaping wide, and lunged forwards.

 

And then all was black and he saw no more.

…---...

When Hajime opened his eyes, he didn’t know where he was. He wasn’t… anywhere he knew. Was he finally dead? That would be a very pitiful death, wouldn’t it? Then again, his entire life was pitiful, so that wouldn’t be new.

 

His eyes were closed, and surprisingly, he felt… a little less uncomfortable than usual. He wasn’t still alive, was he? He shifted a little. It felt too damn real to be an afterlife…

 

“He moved!”

 

And with that, his eyes shot open as his eardrums rang.

 

“He’s awake?”

 

“Thanks for stating the obvious!”

 

“Well, at least he’s alive and kicking!”

 

“Kicking? He just woke up, you idiot!”

 

“Everyone, quiet! He’s been out for days, and all this noise can’t be good for him!”

 

“You’re yelling too!”

 

“Shut up!”

 

“Silence!”

 

“Oh, quit your bullshit!”

Hajime’s head hurt. His head hurt a lot, and he wished he was actually dead. This couldn’t be heaven… he was… alive, and… that was… voices… people around him… what? Why?

 

“Is he blind or something? He… his eyes are open, but he isn’t looking at anything… that’s… not good, is it?”

 

“N-No, but hh-he could b-be still processing… everyone give him some space… p-please...”

 

“You heard her.”

 

“We’re listening to the skank now? How far have we fallen?”

 

“Shut up, you little bitch!”

 

“Hey! What did I do to you”

 

“You want to fucking know what you did, you---”

 

“Shut up, both of you!”

 

More grumbling, then, finally, quiet.

 

Hajime blinked. Once, lightly, and his vision was blurry. He blinked again, harder, and he could finally make things out. The ceiling was...familiar… he shifted a little. Whatever he was lying down on was… not as uncomfortable as sleeping out on the abandoned roads, or in the alleys...

 

He looked around, and it slowly came back to him. This was the… the store he’d been about to leave, before.... before…

 

He could somehow feel the blood leave his face.

 

Before… that had happened.

 

“What? What’s happening now?!”

 

“Is he turning or something?”

 

“Oh _hell_ no, where the fuck is my gun--”

 

“Shut up!”

 

Hajime looked to his right and saw them. They were a ragtag group of people who were barely managing to keep themselves from running away from him. He looked over them and wondered just what he was looking at.

 

Naturally, everyone looked a little worse for wear. There was a small blonde girl in a ragged kimono whose eyes were watching him with some sort of morbid curiosity. It didn’t help that there was a large stick, with dried blood on it. She was… threatening despite her size, and he didn’t want to rub her the wrong way. Ever.

 

Next to her stood a small blonde boy who was looking at him with a far more hostile expression, who was holding a gun… specifically, a pistol. How did he have a gun for goodness sake? Was he raiding every store they could find for bullets or something? Whatever it was, it looked like the boy wouldn’t build trust easily, if at all. And what the boy was wearing… looked like an incomplete pinstripe suit. The pants were there, obviously, but the jacket wasn’t, and the shirt looked like it had seen hell. Something in him felt scared a little.

 

There was another blonde, but she looked different than the others, almost foreign. She probably was foreign… she was pretty as well, though her dress was… lacking. As in, it was barely covering anything at all… and what remained looked very, very aged. More aged-looking than it actually was, probably. And she held… was that… was that a fucking… was that a fucking M-16? And… there was a bat behind her?

 

Hajime suddenly felt like he was in a room filled with dangerous people.

 

There was another girl, whose hair looked like it had been cut pretty badly; it was all kinds of unmatching lengths… and although her dress looked more intact than the tall, foreign blonde’s dress, it was covered in far more blood and dirt than that other one was. That seemed alarming, seeing as she was cowering under his gaze… and what was that she was holding behind her? Whatever it was, it looked… sharp. And shiny. And very, very threatening.

 

There was a guy who… another blonde? Alright, what was this? Whatever the case, he looked like he’d seen better days. Before World War III, the guy had probably been obese, he was sure. He wasn’t exactly slim now, but the way his skin sagged with some miserable looking, near-empty flabs was a bit… disturbing. He looked half-dead, to put it lightly. The man’s eyes were a flat, murky grey and his eyes looked glazed over, and his posture was almost inhumanly stiff and slightly disjointed. Something in his stomach rolled as he looked away, shuddering.

 

There was another girl, with brown skin. It didn’t look like a fake spray tan either. Hajime felt a bit surprised. That wasn’t too common in Japan, but… he couldn’t really say anything on the subject. But either way, she was the scariest of the bunch. She looked to have some muscle on her, and she was… frightening. There was some sort of heavy chain wrapped around her right forearm, and she was casually leaning on a brutal-looking club which was… that was fucking covered in blood. Not to speak of the fact that she herself was covered in blood and grime, moreso than anyone else… she was obviously the powerhouse of the group.

 

At that moment, he felt like dying of fear.

 

He gulped and started looking around for the exit.

 

“Trying to run away?” the small blonde boy snarled. “You’re not going anywhere unless you want a fucking bullet through your head!” the pistol was aimed at his head. “Who the fuck are you?”

 

Of all the times to have to make an introduction… “H-Hajime… Hajime Hinata!” I wanted a peaceful death, not this kind of death please no please no!

 

“What the fuck was you doing here before we got here?”

 

“G-Getting supplies…”

 

“Then why the fuck was you passed out when we got here? Huh? Explain, bastard!”

 

“P-Passed out, what are you talking about--”

  
“Don’t start that bullshit, tell the god-damned truth!”

 

“I-I never… I don’t remember fainting!”

 

“Are you fucking--”

 

“Fuyuhiko, stop please!” the girl with the badly-cut hair said, looking like she was about to cry. “He wouldn’t remember fainting if it happened under stressful circumstances…”

 

“Who the fuck asked you to talk, Mikan?!”

 

“I-I’m sorry… but you know there were signs of a zombie attack… and look at him, he looks like he was barely able to fend it off!”

 

“Alright, pig breath, we get it! Shut up!” the small blonde girl yelled. She turned to Hajime. “So how the hell did you fend off a zombie with your bare hands, huh? You look like a scrawny weakling who would have run away from home as soon as he saw a zombie had killed his parents!”

 

Hajime’s head suddenly… felt like it… lurched forward and things seemed to get fuzzy around the edges, as if… as if… something was… missing… in… his… memories…

 

 

Oh god what was that thing why was it in the house oh my fucking god this madness hasn’t spread to Japan has it oh my god it has its a fucking zombie it’s a fucking zombie in my house oh my god my parents where are they I have to leave what is this thing doing here, it's coming towards me what do i do oh my god stop it stop it run into the kitchen it’s fucking chasing me OH MY FUCKING GOD MY PARENT WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS ITS FUCKING BEHIND ME WHAT IS THIS I HAVE TO DEFEND MY--- AAAAAAAAAAAAAA WHAT THE FUCK DID I DO WAIT WHY IS THERE A KNIFE IN ITS HEAD WHY AM I COVERED IN BLOOD WHY AM I ON THE FLOOR I HAVE TO RUN I HAVE TO LEAVE I HAVE TO GET OUT OF HERE I HAVE TO GET OUT OF HERE

 

 

Hajime jolted back to reality and felt the bile racing up his throat, and he barely had any time to turn slightly before he threw up, white noise ringing in his ears, and he could only catch bits of what the others were saying.

 

“Shut up, both of you. Not everybody is ruthless... sociopath… gather... won’t be easy...more people... country… succumb...?”

 

“...useless… infected…? Kill…”

 

“Don’t need… sleeper… infected… dangerous…”

 

“...calculated risks…”

 

“...hurt...help! ...sorry… have to…”

 

“...is fine… natural! ….consider… takes time…”

 

“...ever… hungry!... here… move…”

 

“...weakling… why?”

 

“...doesn’t matter…”

 

And then the white noise got too loud for him to hear, he groaned, covering his ears. He felt like complete and utter trash right now… what the hell were they talking about? He couldn’t bring himself to care right now. In fact, he wished he was dead.

 

And what was that talk about there being signs of a zombie attack earlier? That… he’d… barely managed to fight it off…

 

...what were they talking about, he couldn’t remember anything like that.

 

Then again, he’d had trouble remembering things after he’d gotten sick some time ago. Sometimes he’d just want to curl up and sleep for days, or he’d have these horrific fevers that made him hallucinate all these terrible, random things…

 

And then there was what happened before all of this fresh hell had come up and he’d… crashed, was the only way he could describe it.

 

And if what they were saying was true… that zombie attack could have occurred… if he’d had another feverish episode… and then…

 

Now that he thought about it… he felt something… something at the back of his mind, almost as if something was clawing through wood, trying to get through. As if… he was trying to remember something important but… couldn’t fully get at it.

 

The ringing in his ears intensified and he heard someone scream. They sounded muffled like it was heard through ten layers of static. He felt himself fall over, and he covered his face with his arms like he was trying to hide from something…

 

For the life of him, he couldn’t understand why.

 

Then there was more yelling and he felt himself curl up; it was too loud, too noisy, to god damned scary! He didn’t want any of this, he wanted to be left alone, to die in peace, what had he gone to deserve this?

 

They yelling escalated and his vision swam, he could hardly see anything…

 

Then he felt someone start shaking him, yelling a bunch of nonsense he didn’t want to comprehend. He took a clumsy swing at them and, obviously, missed them. What he did manage to do was fall over again. Of course, the first thing he wanted to do was curl up again, but... they wouldn’t let him do that for some reason.

 

Why? He didn’t even want this in the first place, they could all fuck off as far as he was concerned! He tried to squirm away and curl up in comfort until this was all over, but they wouldn’t let him!

 

He could feel two people holding him down, and straining to do so. Something in him felt vaguely happy about that. He wasn’t exactly strong, but he could do something for self-defense, at least.

 

But then he felt something heavy as hell just… practically fall onto his torso and pinned his arms down. There were more high-pitched babbling and more nonsensical noises that h didn’t want to decipher. What the hell were they doing?

 

They were holding one of his arms out, and he turned to look at it.

 

Even though his vision had blurred badly, he could see the scars on his forearm. Four thin, ragged, deep scars, all expelling some form pus. He hadn’t… felt that… happening… at all…

 

...unless it was some sort of spontaneous infection.

 

With that, his mind blanked, and he saw no more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So how was that? Constructive criticism would be appreciated!

**Author's Note:**

> I'm assuming that some things were a bit confusing... The rectangular thing with a few knobs on it that let out light, was a phone. The white things that he was gnawing on after he'd finished the body were bones.
> 
> Please tell me what you thought of this!


End file.
